Olympus Has Fallen (2013)

Olympus Has Fallen Synopsis

Disgraced former Presidential guard Mike Banning finds himself trapped inside the White House in the wake of a terrorist attack; using his inside knowledge, Banning works with national security to rescue the President from his kidnappers.

In the year that brought us two "White House in Peril" films, Olympus succeeded in being more memorable that White House Down. It banked $161 million in global receipts, though producers likely assume that the shift in location to the UK for London Has Fallen will help push the sequel to a worldwide market.

London Has Fallen has plummeted into chaos after it was announced that its director, Fredrik Bond, had left the project just over a month before production started on the blockbuster and only a couple of weeks after he was initially hired. Millennium studios have declared that creative differences led to his departure, and they’ve announced that they hope to have a replacement hired by the end of the weekend.

The sequel reportedly will go into production in London on May 5, 2014. The plot will follow, according to the site, “a plot to strike the city [of London] during the funeral of the British Prime Minister. Only the President Of The United States, his secret service head and an English MI6 agent can save the day.”

With TV’s fall season just over the horizon, there are a ton of big TV dramas and comedies available on DVD this week. Additionally, fans can purchase Antoine Fuqua’s Olympus Has Fallen, the explosive assault on the White House movie starring Morgan Freeman and Gerard Butler.

Olympus has Fallen hit theaters back in March, where itdid decently at the box office and slightly less decently with reviews. Being a spring flick, the movie had some competition from another heavy action film, G.I. Joe: Retaliation, but still managed to hold its own, bringing in $122 million worldwide.

One reason audiences check out Fuqua’s drama is the realistic sequences involving terrorist raids on recognizable Washington, D.C. landmarks like the National Monument and, of course, the White House. But as you can see via the visual effects clip shared above, almost all of it is digitally enhanced to bolster the illusion.

Perhaps looking to follow up on their success with the Ice Age series of movies, Fox released the highly mediocre but also highly franchisable The Croods this weekend. The reception in theaters wasn't record breaking, but it was enough to give the movie a solid Spring Break number one debut, leaving star studded Olympus Has Fallen in the dust.

Though there are pretty much no guarantees at the box office-- studios will pump hundreds of millions of dollars into films that seem like sure things and go on to be bombs-- it's hard to go wrong with an animated children's film around the season of spring break. DreamWorks Animation, which needed a hit after last fall's disappointing Rise of the Guardians , scored another this weekend with The Croods, which made $11.6 million on Friday and is on track for a $42 million weekend

Olympus has fallen, and the only person who can revive it is Eric D. Snider, who we bring in to help us review the new Gerard Butler action film Olympus Has Fallen. Is it too violent? Is it ridiculous? Is it kind of great? All that, plus your answers to our lightning round question about the next auteur to have a surprise hit

When you see Gerard Butler slipping through the darkened hallways, taunting the bad guy over the phone and pulling off some insane stunts in the name of rescuing someone beloved to him, it's hard not to feel a little bit of deja vu. The formula of "lone guy in a building saving the day" has been replicated many, many times since the original Die Hard came out in 1988, but rarely as closely as Olympus Has Fallen, which essentially imagines what it would be like if it was the White House instead of Nakatomi Plaza.

Olympus gets an important jump on its competition, Roland Emmerich’s White House movie, by coming out first. And it has a solid cast, adding Morgan Freeman and Aaron Eckhart to a cast led by Butler. But really, it’s Die Hard in the White House, with Butler doing his best John McClane. After the abysmal A Good Day to Die Hard, everything looks like a step in a better direction.

Antoine Fuqua’s Olympus Has Fallen will have to throw some creative wrenches into the works in order to distance itself from the plethora of other films, both good and bad, that are about attacks on the White House and presidential kidnappings.

This weekend has to be seen as the most perfect one in existence for the folks behind the new action thriller Olympus Has Fallen. Not only are we about to enter President's Day weekend, which is perfect for a movie about the commander-in-chief, but A Good Day To Die Hard is now in theaters, which is ideal for a project that was sold being described as "Die Hard in the White House."

Between the feel-good comedy of NBC's 1600 Penn and the real-life farce that is real life in Washington D.C., it feels like it’s been a long time since we’ve seen a U.S. President having to save his own ass from something, Air Force One style> It would also be nice if it could be done with a President we actually care about, like 24’s President Palmer. Will everyman Aaron Eckhart be that guy?

Gerard Butler stars Mike Banning, a former secret service agent who retired after the accidental death of the First Lady. But when 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is besieged by North Korean commandos, Banning rushes to the aid of the President (Aaron Eckhart) and his son.

Set to arrive in theaters on March 22, 2013, Olympus Has Fallen centers on Mike Banning (Gerard Butler), a former elite member of the President's secret service who leaves his job after a devistating incident. But when Banning finds himself in the White House when it comes under attack, he discovers that he is the only person help the President (Aaron Eckhart) walk away from the situation alive.

Can Gerard Butler's career be rescued? He seems to be in a pretty rough spot right now, starring in the virtually ignored Playing for Keeps and with the little-see Chasing Mavericks, Coriolanus and Machine Gun Preacher as the last few titles on his resume. But he'll at least be getting back into his action star wheelhouse for his next project

When Roland Emmerich cast Channing Tatum to star in his thriller White House Down, about a secret service agent defending the President's home from a terrorist attack, it seemed like this was the project that won the war. Because, like asteroids and Truman Capote biopics before it, "White House under siege" movies were suddenly in vogue

After her outstanding performance in The Fighter, I feel like I should have been more prepared for Melissa Leo's excellent guest spot in last week's episode of Louis C.K.'s FX comedy series Louie, and yet, there I was, once again blown away by the actress, particularly in the scene between her character and Louie, which involved her insistence that he reciprocate a certain oral act she'd very recently bestowed upon him.

Dylan McDermott has taken a part as a secret service agent in Olympus Has Fallen. Set to be directed by Antoine Fuqua, the story has been described as "Die Hard in the White House" and is based on a spec script written by Creighton Rothenberger and Katrin Benedik. The project has been moving along swiftly in recent weeks, as Roland Emmerich is currently developing a very similar project called White House Down with Channing Tatum.

Among the projects in the works from Antoine Fuqua is Millennium Films' action movie Olympus Has Fallen, which will have Gerard Butler starring as a Secret Service agent responding to a terrorist attack from North Koreans who have taken over the White House as part of a plot to detonate nuclear weapons on U.S. soil.

Just like when we had two Truman Capote movies (Capote, Infamous), two sex friends movies (No Strings Attached, Friends With Benefits) and two Snow White movies (Mirror, Mirror, Snow White and the Huntsman) in development, Hollywood is currently trying to make two separate movies that have been described as "Die Hard in the White House."

Hollywood is never afraid to show its pure lack of originality on its sleeve, but it's still upsetting when it gets this terrible. But do you want to know something even worse? Now there are two projects in the works that can both be described as "like Die Hard, but set in the White House."

That sounds…. insane. But also kind of fantastic, since as Variety themselves point out, it's basically Die Hard set in the White House-- an idea so obvious and brilliant I'm amazed John McClane himself didn't do it at some point. Butler has had big action star potential ever since his breakout role in 300